It was my first trip to the Death Valley NP last week. I wish it was a couple of weeks sooner as the weather had started to heat up and we encountered 100 degrees on a couple of days with mid to upper 90s on other days. The salt polygons weren't to be found in their pristine shape in the badwater area. There was quite a bit of haze as well due to the heat build up.

Didn't make it to the race track this time. Talking with people who had gone there during our trip, it turns out wasn't a bad decision. Apparently people have been taking the stones from there. Most people found only one or two. On the good side they are grading the roads and one guy I talked to made it there in his Subaru Outback.

Just started sorting and processing the photos. Here is one from Badwater during sunset.

Well.. nice photo you have. I would not mind of having water at the Badwater so I could have this nice reflection anyway. The salt crust at the Badwater was not pretty when I went there in February. Also what a disappointment at the Racetrack! Almost no stones.. only small stones... Thanks for sharing your picture.
~Kee

Nicely done on the image Jamie, though the reflection seems brighter than the rest of the scene.

It would be horrible if there were only 1 or 2 rocks left at the racetrack, and though there seems to be problems with people messing with the rocks, I think the people you talked to might have just gone to the Grandstand area and didn't go further south to where most of the rocks are located.